


Hiraeth

by SignificantlySimon



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Past Character Death, Past Relationship(s), Post-Canon, ptsd mention, recreational cannabis use
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-25
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-18 03:02:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28985313
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SignificantlySimon/pseuds/SignificantlySimon
Summary: Hiraeth (Welsh pronunciation: [hɪraɨ̯θ, hiːrai̯θ]) is a Welsh word for longing or nostalgia, an earnest longing or desire, or a sense of regret. The feeling of longing for a home that no longer exists or never was.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter 1

> _"Any news on the ten years anniversary tournament?"_
> 
> _"I hear Haruto Tenjo is head of the planning team. I hope they bring back the finalists from the first one."_
> 
> _"Me too! I'd love to see Yuma again."_

Vector scoffs at the naivete of a conversation he isn’t a part of in the slightest. He keeps his gaze low, eyes unfocused on the cellphone screen in front of his face to not raise suspicion as he eavesdrops. He’d love to pretend he’s simply listening to music like the headphones suggest but they’re turned off. He’s come far too close to succeeding now. He can’t miss a single detail no matter how far-fetched his methods of gathering information are.

> _“I hope Shark comes back too. It seems like he just-... left?”_
> 
> _“I don’t think his sister even knows where he is.”_
> 
> _“I wonder if they filed a missing person’s report.”_

‘They didn’t,’ Vector thinks. There was no point. He’d make it known if he wanted to be found even if he didn’t want to be found alive. That excludes the possibility that he’d been killed. Even then, that man isn’t stupid. He’d find a way to make it known.

> _“I hope he realizes how much people loved him. He was the reason my brother started dueling, you know. He almost made it to the finals of the World Duel Carnival last year.”_
> 
> _“I just hope he’s safe… Wherever he is.”_

Safety is relative when it comes to Shark. Vector knows this, they all do. They witnessed the breakdown he had for months before any of them worked up the courage to approach him about it. 

> _“Yeah… Me too. It seemed like he totally changed his personality before he left.”_
> 
> _“I know. It was insane to see. There was an article that even said he was bipolar.”_

Bipolar? No.

That man had a meltdown encompassing at least three lives of grief and bereavement slammed into one person. Describing it as ‘massive’ would never do justice. 

Vector remembers Emperor Nasch, his first life in a Kingdom completely surrounded by water. The palace was beautiful with its numerous, rather large windows. Each one of them had some sort of view of the sea no matter where or how you looked through them.

This version of him, Vector called his friend until he didn't.

He remembers watching through Don Thousand's eyes as the flame of Nasch’s first life was dampened until it fizzled out with the ocean when he jumped in. The news of the young Emperor’s suicide spread quickly across the world. It was expected but that didn’t make it scathe any less.

The world’s eyes fell on Vector, the direct cause.

He can only guess how relieved the world was when he died not too long after.

It was a botched suicide attempt that did him in. It took far too long and left him bleeding out on the floor of the throne room in agony in his own palace with a sword in his abdomen, alone and scared. He never saw a light at the end of the tunnel.

It was just black as tar and cold as hell.

> _"Didn’t he give up dueling altogether?"_
> 
> _"I think so. But it's been years. He has to say something!"_

He won't. Vector knows this.

> _"He doesn't go on social media either. Like at all. His last post is from three years ago, see?"_
> 
> _“Damn…”_

King of the Barians. Life number two. It came and went after nearly a millennia. No memories of his former life, nothing of his past. It was that way for all seven of them. They were made to believe they had always been that way, that there was no life before their false god. He hated Nasch then.

Every mention of the man made his blood boil. 

Which is saying something considering that they didn't really have blood as Barians. It was more akin to cold oil, thick and viscous as it flowed from an open wound. It stained fabrics like a bitch too.

Vector killed him then too, played it off like it never happened and that Nasch and Merag simply went missing at the same time. No one suspected a thing. He was Don Thousand's favorite pet rock-... literally and figuratively.

> _"I know Yuma is coming back if they ask him. There's no way he'd miss an opportunity like that!"_
> 
> _"He has to! He made it to the finals before the cameras cut. Do you think they're going to bring back whatever that sphere field was?"_
> 
> _"I hope so. That was insane!"_

Ryouga. Number three. He lived through a child’s eyes for years in blissful ignorance after a car wreck or something. It's unclear. Nasch and Merag never talked about it all that much. All Vector knows about it is that the kids would have died had Vector not thrown Nasch and Merag out of Barian at the right time. Could have been the wrong time too. That’s also unclear.

Vector takes his cup of coffee and stands to leave. He’s heard enough. As he walks back to his car, he turns the music in his headphones on.

After Don Thousand was finally killed, for years after, there was an odd Nasch/Ryoga hybrid, an existential crisis where he wasn't sure which one he was. Somewhere in this fucking mess, he quit dueling and dropped off the map. He bounced from hobby to hobby, from job to job, from lover to lover. They attempted an intervention of some sort but it didn't work.

Three days after that disaster of an intervention, Merag went to drag him out of bed and he wasn't there. The windows were wide open in his bedroom and the curtains fluttered in the bitter autumn breeze.

It was then, as he picked Merag up off the floor, Vector realized that it was autumn then; when he ruined Nasch's first shot at life.

When Merag called the police three days later to see if they’d found anything, they told her to get someone to sit down with her or catch her if she fell. It just so happened that Vector and Allit were in the next room over. They sat next to her on the sofa quietly as the police told her they’d found his cellphone, wallet, and bike ditched on the side of the road. Someone anonymously called it in.

Vector drove her to the police station twenty minutes later. She never cried. She knew this was coming. They all did.

They're all guilty of letting this happen.

A month later Vector woke himself out of a deep sleep for no reason whatsoever and found himself packing a bag at 3 in the goddamn morning. He walked out of the back door before the sun rose, giving no notice beforehand.

At least he left a note on the kitchen counter to say goodbye.

He started there, the exact spot on the side of the freeway where they found Nasch’s things. He parked his own car just three and a half hours outside of heartland; his hazard lights on, headlights off, and keys in his pocket.

He stuck another note on his dashboard.

'Gone to get gas.'

That was a bold lie. He knew somewhere in the back of his mind it wouldn't work but it was worth a shot, worth a chance like this stupid venture.

If they hadn't found a body, there was still hope. He found it just like Nasch did centuries ago and he clung to it, used it as his lifeline. He found himself humming a hymn from his own first life as he searched the hiking trails in the nearby woods for some sign. Any deity would do.

He found a fork in the road, one trail leading left directly up a hill. The other stayed generally flat but was clearly, largely untraveled. He headed left first up the hill until it took the breath from his lungs and he was forced to stop for a minute. The bitter wind chilled him to his bones. It reminded him of something. He just wasn't sure what. He kept walking nonetheless.

In the years that Vector had been resurrected into his original body via numeron code magic or whatever, he had become accustomed to random segments of deja vu. It came and went quickly.

> _“Hey, Vec.”_
> 
> _“Yeah?”_
> 
> _“You ever heard of the word ‘hiraeth’?”_
> 
> _“Bless you.”_
> 
> _“It’s a word for an earnest desire or a sense of regret-...”_
> 
> _“What made you think of that?”_
> 
> _“The feeling of longing for a home that no longer exists.”_
> 
> _“I’m too high for this, Alit.”_

The trail flattened off into a plateau and ended at a clearing in the woods. It was beautiful and in the bitter quiet of the night, Vector found himself wanting to linger. When he turned around to walk back the way he came, he debated walking the other path and whether or not it would be worth it to battle dead grass and briars.

As much as he told himself that it wasn’t worth it, he walked the path regardless.

He walked in silence and listened to the wind whip through the trees overhead. He found himself stopping abruptly at a sudden drop-off. Vector gained a steady footing and peered over the ledge. No one could survive a fall like that. Vector understood why no one walked the path before him. The trail simply ends with the dropoff and if someone wasn't paying attention, well. That would be the last time they ever went on a hike. As he left the woods that night a thought popped in his mind like someone flicked a switch.

_"If you could go anywhere in the world, where would it be, Nasch?"_

_"As far away from Heartland as I possibly can. I like it up north where you get those thick, wooded areas where cliffs drop off into the ocean."_

Of fucking course he did. It mimicked the place that the palace was built in his kingdom.

Vector turned the key and pressed the button to turn off his hazards. He pulled the note from off his dash, surprised it might have worked. He plugged the address for a random town in the general area he knew Nasch was talking about and set a course for a seven-hour drive.

He did so in silence.

Vector drove until he couldn't see straight. It was roughly twelve hours since he'd left Heartland. He found a bed and breakfast run by a sweet couple in a small town on his route. They gave him the room half off that afternoon. He must have looked positively wrecked.

As soon as his head hit the pillow, he was out like a light.

The next day he traveled seven hours farther north and stopped at an even smaller town than the day before, his destination. He was roughly fourteen or so hours outside of heartland at that point. There was no turning back now.

A year later, Vector felt closer than he’d ever been. He stopped at a cafe one morning about a month prior and heard someone talking about a guy that looked like Shark that just started renting a house outside of town. Of course, he needed more information before he knocked on the door but he found himself lingering in the sleepy little town. He got a job at a little shop on the corner selling trinkets to dumb tourists and hikers and signed a twelve-month lease on a studio apartment. It wasn't much but it was enough.

Vector lingered for other reasons too, of course. The wooded areas and quiet cafes had an old-timey charm to them. This place felt like it was untouched by most modern advances and stuck in the mid 20th century, far removed from the noise of Heartland. Vector didn't think places like this existed.

It was a hidden gem in the modern age, more comforting, more homey. So homey, in fact, that the last time he called Merag, he spoke about the possibility of signing a more permanent lease, adopting a pet from the small shelter in town. He assured her that he hadn't given up on finding Nasch but made it known that here felt like home. He still assured her that when he found her brother, he'd drag him home kicking and screaming. But the possibility that Vector could move here, fourteen or so hours away from Heartland, in a quiet town full of hipsters in their 30s and old people, was made clear.

If Merag had an issue, she never made it known.

Vector presses his foot on the brake and hits the start engine button on his car. He turns on the radio but promptly turns it off when he hears an advertisement for the tenth anniversary World Duel Carnival. He drives back to his small apartment in silence.

It's not like he would be the first of the Barians to move away from the Kamishiro mansion. Durbe was first. He received a full scholarship to a university halfway across the country. He'd be dumb not to take that offer. He graduated a few months back with a 4.0 GPA and a bachelor's degree in European History. Merag flew out for his graduation and stayed for two months with him. They came back together before Durbe took a job teaching in a different city last month.

Alit was next. He ended up stashing money away from odd security jobs and moving in with Kotori in an apartment by the university she was attending- or still is. Vector never cared too much. He was 18 then and still finishing high school at the time. He envied the freedom Allit had after graduating early.

This left Mizael and Gilag still in the home with her. This was good. She has some sort of constant support system on hand.

Vector parks in his spot outside of the small corner store that he lived above and sat for a few moments in silence. It had been nearly ten years since he tried to bring about an end to the world via supernatural means and the residual guilt from that weighs heavy and thick around him like a fog. He has to find Nasch whatever the cost.

His alarm blares the next morning and Vector finds himself groggy from a migraine after not getting enough sleep. He walks to work slowly and with a coffee clutched close to his chest. It’s cold, the weather finally broke, and left the warm days of summer behind like a distant memory.

Vector particularly enjoyed autumn here in the middle-of-nowhere ville. The town sat in between mountains, down in the lowest point of the valley. When the leaves changed color they left streaks of red and yellows absolutely everywhere. The smell of the crunchy leaves was almost divine.

However, something feels different about this morning. He couldn’t explain it, but something felt-...

_Odd._

He shakes it off and chalks it up to the changing of the weather.As he was nears his little trinket shop he debates on whether or not to stop at the cafe on the way to grab a bagel or something for breakfast. He checks his bank account and notices that he hadsthe funds even with rent coming out this week, so he does. He opens the door and glances around at the people seated inside before he takes his place in line at the counter.

“Morning Vector! What’ll it be today?”

The barista here in her ever-cheerful personality knows him well. He stopps by here nearly every morning after all. He suspects she has a crush on him but he wasn’t too sure. Once he finds Nasch, he'll consider the possibility of taking her on a date or two just for the hell of it. Why not?

“I’m thinking bacon, egg, and cheese today, Mercy.”

“Always a classic,” she says.

“Always good too,” he replies. “That and the pork roll and cheese.”

She takes his order and passes it through a small window leading to the kitchen.

“Getting cold out there,” she remarks as she pulls her sweater closed across her chest.

“Thank god,” Vector chuckles. “It's stupid humid here in the summer.”

A bell rings behind her and she places a couple of extra napkins in the bag as she usually does. Vector just stashes them in the back room at work at this point. 

“Gotta admit, it is really pretty though.”

Vector agrees and thanks her as he takes his paper bag. He hands her his debit card and glances out the window as he waits for the young woman to hand the card back. When she does, she does so with a wink and mouths the words, ‘text me’ but it doesn’t register. When he turns to walk away as he puts the card in his wallet, he notices she gave him her cell phone number. When he turns back around to protest, he finds she isn’t there. He walks out of the cafe and toys with the idea of actually following through. A simple text never hurt anyone.

He opens the store, unlocks the register, and waits in a comfy desk chair behind the counter. When he hears the bell to the store ring about an hour later, he glances up. He drops his phone on the floor accidentally as he stands to greet the person who just walked in alone. He can’t see the door well from the desk with the register. Anywhere else this would be a bad layout but this community was so small that no one really had to worry about theft. There was rarely an unfamiliar face.

“Anything I can help you find?” Vector asks as he reaches down to pick up his phone.

“The girl at the cafe a few stores down told me you worked here,” the customer says quietly.

Vector doesn’t recognize the voice but as he stands and places his cellphone back on the counter, he catches a good look at the man who just walked in. 

Vector looks at him for a few seconds in stunned silence. His hair is tied back in a messy, windblown bun.

Vector practically jumps over the counter and runs to him. Half rage, the rest pure adrenaline. He is within three feet of the man when his knees begin to shake. Despite all of the words he thought he would say to him when he found him, planned meticulously during long car rides and cold showers, Vector found himself drawing a blank.

“Her name-...” He freezes and reaches out to him. His trembling hand lands on his shoulder and holds on for dear life. “It- its Mercy.”

“What are you doing all the way out here?”

“I’ve been looking for you,” Vector replies. 

Nasch steps forward when Vector expects him to run away and wraps his arms around him. It isn’t the best hug by any means but it's something. It's nice to feel the warmth of another living, breathing being after so long.

He doesn’t know how long he’s been standing there, fighting back tears and trembling, but he hears a sigh leave Nasch’s lips, feels the man’s shoulders relax and the cold tip of his nose as he stands on his tiptoes to pull himself closer in. Vector never thought he was a particularly warm-blooded person but Nasch is freezing despite being bundled for a blizzard in the middle of autumn.

When Vector pulls away, he grabs Nasch by the arm and sits him on the desk chair he practically kicked through the wall behind him when Nasch walked in. He, in turn, hoists himself up to sit on the wooden countertop. He swivels the space heater under the counter to face Nasch more directly too and he leans into it.

“Do you have my sister’s number?” He asks. “I tried calling her months ago but it keeps going to voicemail. The texts I sent got read but there wasn’t a reply to any of them.”

Vector doesn’t hesitate to pull his phone out of his pocket and hand it unlocked, with Merag’s contact information open to Nasch.

Nasch takes out his own phone in turn. It’s much nicer than the one he had a year and a half ago despite the cracked screen protector. Vector double-checks the contact’s number with the one he has. He notices the multitude of outgoing missed and or rejected calls in the history under the number. Nasch sighs as he realizes they have the same number and calls using his phone. He puts it on speaker.

- _The number you are trying to reach is no longer in service. Please hang up or try a different number. Goodbye.-_

He sighs again and it falls out broken in two. Vector furrows his brow and takes his phone back from Nasch. He then does the only logical thing he can think of. He calls Merag right then and there, puts it on speakerphone too.

She answers.

“Merag?” Vector asks.

“Yeah. What’s up? You never call me this early,” she replies, a slight chuckle in her voice.

“I found Nasch. He’s right here in front of me. He’s okay.”

_Silence._

“Merag?”

His heart sinks into his stomach when he realizes she hung the phone up on him.

Vector glances down at Nasch with a confused look on his face. Nasch shifts uncomfortably in his chair, crosses his legs and leans forward. Neither of them know what to think, let alone what to do. Nasch goes to stand but Vector reaches out for the other man’s cell phone without a word which is placed willingly in his hand. Vector taps at the keypad on the screen and hands it back to him.

“It’s Durbe. He doesn’t live in Heartland anymore but-”

Nasch hits the green call button at the bottom of the screen and presses the phone to his ear. Vector notices as Nasch’s hands start to tremble, pinpoints the moment his anxiety spikes, and takes note of the tears that well up at the corner of Nasch’s eyes that he blinks rapidly in an attempt to will them away. Vector feels it too, that feeling of unfamiliar territory. Nasch said he tried to get in contact with his sister. He showed him proof that he did. He tried and was shot down. In a matter of seconds, Vector somewhat understands Nasch’s decision to drop off the map. 

After what feels like an eternity, Durbe picks up the phone.

“It’s Nasch,” his voice cracks. “I’m okay.”

Nasch puts his phone on speaker and places it on the counter in front of him. He rubs at his eyes and swallows down cries.

Vector hears Durbe sigh in relief.

“Fuck, Nasch. I’m so happy to hear your voice.”

“I need you to try and get a hold of Merag for me. I’ve been trying to get a hold of her for months but she blocked my new number. Vector tried calling her and she hung up as soon as he mentioned me.”

“Vector found you?”

“Not on purpose but he’s here.”

“Can he hear me?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ve got Merag. I’m gonna book a train ticket as soon as we hang up. She still live with Miza and them?”

“To my knowledge,” Vector chimes in. 

“Cool. And Nasch?”

“Yeah?”

“Stay safe. Save my contact. I’m here if you need me.”

“Okay.”

After Durbe hangs up the phone, the two sit in silence. There are so many things both need to say but now is not the time. Vector hands Nasch an unopened bottle of water and slides the box of tissues towards him. Nasch ignores the tissues but grabs the water readily. It takes a few more moments for Nasch to regain himself. They exchange numbers and set a date to grab a cup of coffee and some breakfast at a diner across town. As Nasch walks out of the door to the shop, Vector silently prays to gods that have been long ignored that Nasch holds true to his promise.

The rest of the day drags on slowly. In the middle of the night he is added to a group text message created by Alit.

“Baddest Barian Bitches,” Vector reads out loud. He laughs too.

Then he notices all seven accounted for. Nasch’s new number at the top of the list. He waits for someone else to send a message first and falls asleep as he does but he wakes up to roughly fifty unread messages in the morning. He scrolls through them quickly but pauses on the photos Nasch sent.

He finds one of Nasch holding an obscenely large cat that looks to be about half his size. He looks like he just rolled out of bed with his hair tied back in a messy ponytail. He’s grinning ear to ear though.

_‘Foofie came with the house. The daughter of the former owner thought she was lost for good but two weeks after I moved in, she ran up to me when I was getting the mail. She’s a brat but I love her.’_

Vector saves the photo.

“Cute,” he says to no one.


	2. Chapter 2

Three days later Vector ends up at the diner. He goes in right away and notices Nasch sitting at a booth by the window alone. Vector waves hello to the hostess and sits across from him. He looks more put together than he did when he first saw him. His hair is tied half up with small pieces picked out to frame his face. He’s in a grey button-down cardigan with a light blue button-down shirt underneath. He smiles at him from behind his cup of tea which is raised to his lips.

The waiter brings over two menus with a small smile. He looks rough like he’s just nearing the end of his shift. Vector asks for a cup of coffee though. No cream or sugar. He smiles and thanks him as he takes the menu despite already knowing what he wants. 

He’s been to this diner nearly a thousand times but never with someone else.

“I was starting to think that you’d never show up,” Nasch says with a smirk as he puts down his cup of tea.

“I’m perfectly on time. In fact, I’m ten minutes early," he replies. “Not my fault you’re painfully punctual.”

Vector takes his coat off and places it in the empty spot to his right in the booth. He steals a glance out of the window. The clouds over the sun make 11 am look shockingly like 11 pm. He quickly checks his phone after he brings it out of his pocket and snickers at the snow in the forecast.

“As much as I love it here, the snow is a bitch,” he says.

“Yeah,” Nasch chuckles. "I've been meaning to ask you; how did you end up all the way out here?"

Vector knew this question would come up. Despite dreading it, he answers honestly. "The first night I left, about a month after you did, I started looking in the place the police found your stuff. I walked those hiking trails for hours before I remembered something you told me years ago," Vector says. "I asked you if you could go anywhere in the world-"

"And I told you up north, didn't I?

"Yeah."

"Fuck. That was a while ago. How do you remember that?"

"No idea. But I just kept setting my GPS for towns further north until I ended up here. After running around for so long, I got tired of moving. I signed a six-month lease, got a job and all. I planned for it to be temporary. A recharge kinda thing but I told myself that once I found you, I'd come back here and stay."

"I wasn't supposed to be here for long either," Nasch tells him. "I ended up sleeping with a guy about six hours south of here in a hostel. He offered to drive me up here and let me stay in his spare bedroom for a week or two while I got my footing."

Vector chuckles. "Fucking miracle you didn't end up dead."

"I know. I love it up here though,” Nasch says. He places his hands on his cup of tea and looks out the window to his left. It just started to rain outside

"It's so different from Heartland," Vector says. "It feels more like home."

"I know what you mean.”

The waiter comes back and they give him their order. Vector gets his usual; two eggs sunny side up, a side of bacon, white toast. Nasch orders eggs benedict and a side of rye toast with strawberry jam. Vector notices now that Nasch never touched the menu either.

“How often do you come here?” Vector asks him.

“Once a week or so. I meet clients here sometimes for lunch.”

Vector raises an eyebrow and smirks. “Clients, huh?”

Nasch laughs with a smile, harder than expected. An elderly couple sitting nearby turns to look at them. When Nasch notices he quiets down, his voice nearly a whisper as he leans in. “Hardly the place for sex work, don’t you think?”

Vector’s jaw drops. If anyone would find sex work in a place like this, it would be Nasch. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Just never something he expected to associate with the man sitting across from him. “You’re fucking kidding,” he whispers.

“Absolutely,” Nasch replies. “I’m a ghostwriter. I write for political journals and stuff. Gotta put that knowledge to use somehow.”

Vector doesn’t know whether or not to be amazed. He stays silent instead.

“While the politics aren’t the same, it doesn’t take a bachelor’s degree to know when someone’s a good leader,” Nasch says as he takes another sip from his tea.

“You’d think but some of the people back in Heartland have lost their minds.” Vector takes a sip of the coffee that’s just been placed in front of him. “That’s another thing I like up here-”

“Oh yeah. It's insanely liberal. If you get to know some of the people around here, you’ll find out that this is a town completely of outcasts one way or another.”

“What do you mean?”

“Mercie, the girl at the coffee shop, was abandoned by her family when she was little and bounced around from foster home to foster home until she ran away a week before her 18th birthday.”

“Oh shit. I never knew that.”

“The waiter here used to live in Heartland.” Nasch motions towards him inconspicuously. “Grew up there in the areas I hung around when I had my breakdown. Got involved with some bad people and essentially booked it as far away from Heartland as possible. I went on a date or two with him but we didn’t really click.”

“Is he the guy you came up here with?”

“Oh fuck no. I caught that piece of shit balls-deep in another guy when I came back from work early one day. Since my name wasn’t on the lease, I had to leave. I hope he rots.”

“Jeez,” Vector mutters. “Sorry you had to deal with that.”

He takes a sip from his coffee and enjoys the silence between them. It isn’t tense or heavy. It's rather peaceful. When he glances back at Nasch, his gaze is turned out the window again. Vector assumes he's looking at the way the heavy waterfalls off the leaves and puddles in the cracks and holes in the sidewalk but after another glance, he realizes that Nasch might not be focusing on anything at all.

He debates on asking but leaves it. As much as Vector hates walking on eggshells around anyone, he needs to tread carefully with Nasch no matter how put-together he seems. He’d hate to lose him again.

“Durbe got to Merag, right?” Nasch asks.

“Yeah,” Vector replies. “About six hours or so after you left the shop.”

Vector shifts uncomfortably in his seat. He knows where she is but doesn’t know how to tell Nasch, her overprotective twin brother, without raising alarm.

“She still has my number blocked,” Nasch says. “I tried calling her again after Alit added us all to the group chat. Is she safe?”

“She’s safe but-” He puts the cup of coffee down in front of him. “Nasch you’re gonna want to look at me.”

“Fuck. Do I need to go back to Heartland?”

“She went with Durbe to check into an inpatient care facility last night. According to him, she went willingly after Miza suggested it. They all went with her. She wanted them to.”

A certain heaviness falls visibly on Nasch’s shoulders. He places his hands in his lap and tightens his chest. He tears his eyes away and looks out the fucking window again. Vector is getting frustrated but he is trying his damned best not to let it show. He breathes deep, in his nose and out of his mouth.

“Why didn’t they tell me?”

Vector presses his forearms on the table and leans in slightly, fingers laced together. He lowers his voice and attempts to lock eyes with Nasch but he’s returned his gaze to the window and whatever he finds so interesting outside. “They wanted me to. It's the kind of stuff best-delivered face-to-face.”

Nasch pulls his sweater closed, right over left, and folds his hands tightly under his chin. He’s thinking. Analyzing the words that just fell from Vector’s tongue. He looks at him and tries to read the expression on his face. Vector can pinpoint the exact moment Nasch realizes something and wonders if he’ll actually speak his mind.

“She’s safe. She’s where she needs to be.” Nasch sighs. The tension in his shoulders falls and a small smile spreads on his lips. “And you’re worried about me.”

_‘Of fucking course I am. I spent a year looking for your bitchass only to find you on accident in the middle of bumfuck nowhere in the middle of the woods. If I didn’t decide to get breakfast three days ago I would have never fucking found you. I was three weeks away from going farther north. I almost missed you. I never realized how much I need-’_

Vector scoffs, takes his coffee, and leans back in the booth. “Yeah, I guess.”

The waiter brings their food over shortly after. He refills Vector’s coffee and brings Nasch another cup of tea. When the waiter addresses Nasch this time, he uses his name. Vector doesn't know why he’s shocked to hear someone else call him ‘Nasch’ but he is nonetheless.

Nasch notices somehow.

“Ryouga is dead, Vector,” he reminds him.

He agrees.

They finish their meal in content silence. Vector calms down and protests when Nasch insists he pays for both of them.“You never stopped looking for me,” he says. “It’s the least I can do.”

In the entryway of the diner, Nasch hugs him and thanks him again. They walk outside into the rain together. Vector watches as Nasch runs to his car like he’s running from an ostrich or some other obscenely large animal. He chuckles at his thought and walks at a relatively normal pace to his own car. It unlocks automatically as he gets close and he happily sits inside and closes the door quickly to keep the rain from messing with the already broken electronics in the door. 

But when he presses his foot on the brake and hits the “engine on” button, it doesn’t even try to start.

He lets out a colorful string of curses and tries again. When the second time produces the same result, he tries a third time but presses his foot on the brake harder as if that will accomplish anything. He hears a knock at his window and turns his head to see that it is, in fact, Nasch. He presses the button to roll the window down, realizes again that his car is beyond dead, and grumbles as he reaches over to manually unlock the door to let Nasch in and out of the god-forsaken rain.

Vector’s blood is practically boiling as Nasch sits in the passenger seat and scrunches his nose slightly at the stale smell of old cigarettes. He doesn’t smoke anymore, hasn’t in almost six months, but it didn’t mean he’d run through a pack every other day when he first left Heartland. Stress, he supposed. Some sort of outlet.

Nasch checks something on his phone before he even attempts to speak and when he does, he’s somewhat drowned out by the buckets of rain falling on Vector’s clunky shitwagon of a car.

“I could give you a jump but I don’t wanna risk doing anything in the rain if we don’t have to,” Nasch says.

“Understandable,” Vector replies, short and sweet.

Nasch checks the weather on his phone and says something that Vector doesn’t hear quite right so he ignores it.

“Vec?”

“Yeah.”

“You could come back to my house for a bit. Wait out the rain and stuff. We can be back before the snow starts tonight.”

Every fiber in his being is telling him to deny the invitation but he definitely does not want to walk a mile and a half in this rain which has since turned to god-damned sleet before his eyes. He wants so desperately to deny and say that he’s fine, that he’ll take care of it himself. He wants to be alone, drown out the stress of one of the seven former, gloriously terrifying, Barian Emperors getting checked into a mental hospital. He wants to sit in silence, possibly high out of his mind, and think of nothing but the song blasting in his headphones. He wants to be alone.

However, he agrees even though he most definitely could have asked Nasch to drive him home.

Nasch hands over his keys to Vector and points out his car a few spaces over. “I’m gonna let the diner know that we’ll be back so they don’t tow it,” he tells Vector.

All Vector can manage to do is nod.

He gets out of his car, ensures that all of the doors are manually locked since the battery is fucking shot, and gets into the driver’s seat of Nasch’s car to start it.

The first thing he notices is a polaroid picture in the passenger seat cup holder. Vector curiously picks it up to look at it. He chuckles at the image of all seven of the “baddest Barian bitches”, as Alit called them. He remembers this party though. It was to celebrate Alit, Merag, Nasch, and Durbe’s graduation from High School. Coincidentally, one year before the start of Nasch’s breakdown.

He notices Nasch walking back to the car and decides to simply hop over the center console to get into the passenger seat, the picture still in his hand. He doesn’t put it back in the cupholder until Nasch puts the car into drive.

He notices but says nothing.

The house is on the outskirts of town, nestled on top of a steep hill with a gravel driveway leading to the top. It's a nice little cottage with a two-car garage separated from the main house but directly on top of the driveway. No neighbors in sight either. That is a nice bonus.

“I hate the gravel but it grips better when shit ices over,” Nasch tells him. “I almost had it repaved when I bought the place.”

Vector second-guesses what he definitely just heard. “Wait.”

Nasch presses his foot on the brake and switches the car into park before he looks up at Vector. “What?”

“You own this?”

“Yeah actually. It's been two months now I think.”

Vector thinks for a moment about his small studio apartment and can’t help but feel somewhat jealous. Nasch gets out of the car and closes the door behind him. He waits for a few seconds to see if Vector is going to follow him. Against his better judgment, he does. He follows Nasch up three wooden stairs and onto a small deck leading to the front door. He watches as Nasch quickly unlocks it and steps inside. Vector follows quickly after.

“It’s a little outdated in here,” Nasch apologizes. “The former owner’s daughter sold it as it was when her mom died. She just needed time to collect little chachkies and things. She comes back here and there to get stuff from the attic.”

Vector isn’t truly paying attention. He’s too busy focused on the fact that in a little over a year Nasch has not only recovered from a massive mental breakdown, but he has also managed to nail down a steady job that pays well enough for him to save up and put a downpayment on a house. An outdated house, sure, but it's got good bones. That much is apparent.

Vector nearly jumps out of his skin when he feels something brush up against his leg. He looks down to find a large, all-white Maine Coon cat with a large pink bow tied around its neck to match. He recognizes it from one of the pictures. Nasch sent in the group chat.

“That's Foofie. She was unintentionally a part of the deal with the house,” Nasch says.

Foofie stretches, stands on her hind legs, and presses her front paws on Vector’s calf.

“If you’re not scared of cat hair, she likes to be picked up and placed over your shoulder.”

Vector doesn’t hesitate to pick her up and do as Nasch said. He presses his cheek to her side and listens to her pur as she relaxes into the hold. He forgot just how much he missed having a pet run around. Vector notices that the ribbon around the cat’s neck is actually attached to a breakaway collar with a little golden bell on the front. Of course, Nasch would spoil any animal that worms its way into his home. He’d never tie a ribbon around a cat’s neck without some sort of precaution.

He remembers a time when they were kids over three millennia ago when Nasch brought a small rabbit abandoned by its family into the palace right under his father’s nose. Well, they did together and got in so much trouble for it. Nasch always had a soft spot for animals. Always has, always will.

Vector takes another step into the house and locks the door behind himself, a force of habit, and notices a square conversation pit to his right straight out of the 1970s surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides. The dark grey cushions are new and look extremely soft. Vector also notices a book with a map on the cover on top of the coffee table and steps forward, Foofie in tow, to get a better look. “Atlantis?” He asks.

“Oh yeah. I found that in an antique shop downtown,” Nasch says. His face turns red as he walks closer to where Vector is currently standing. “It's uh-... the most accurate that I’ve found.”

“Your kingdom wasn’t even called Atlantis though.”

“No, but other people called it that. Funny how things we lived through ended up in the history books, huh? Just a little different from what we remember.”

“Not gonna lie, Nasch. I’m really fucking glad that I didn’t end up in history books.”

It's not like he wouldn't have ended up in quite a few if there was someone left to tell his story. Then again, he would live in infamy for the rest of time as the King who slaughtered his people for no reason.

Nasch looks away. “Ah,” he says softly. “Right.”

Vector realizes that his previous statement came out slightly too harsh. “I’m sorry,” he says softly. “It was supposed to be a joke.”

Nasch smirks and pats Floofie on the head as he walks past Vector. 

The cat begins to squirm in Vector’s loose hold and he lowers her to the ground carefully so she doesn’t break a leg. Nasch practically launches himself into the conversation pit and flops down on the cushions. Foofie runs up to him, jumps down onto his chest, and makes herself comfortable.

“Weather radar says that we have till 3:30. Make yourself comfortable. We’ve got a while. Oh also don’t use the bathroom downstairs. I literally haven’t been in it at all. I’m honestly kinda scared to go in there. Door was closed when I moved in. Master bathroom is upstairs connected to the bedroom to the right. It was one of the first rooms I took down to the studs.”

Vector’s curiosity piques. “What was the first room?”

“My office to your left. The old lady that lived here made that her bedroom when she got too old to walk up the stairs. The medical examiner said she sat for at least two weeks in the middle of the summer.”

“Fucking gross,” Vector says.

"Yeah. Biohazard cleanup gutted that room. But missed some stains on the foundation. Took me so long to scrub that up. So that room was first. It also gave me a nice place to work from home.”

"You work from home?"

"Most of the time, yeah. It's easier that way. The driveway gets disgustingly icy. I'm terrified of folding my car around a tree."

Vector doesn’t respond. He’s too focused on the paint swatches on the wall directly in front of him. “That blue-grey would look good as an accent wall,” he says.

Nasch moves the cat from his chest to his lap and sits up. “I was thinking either that or the dark grey for the wall to the left as soon as you walk in.”

Vector goes to walk forward to get a better look around. He expects Nasch to protest in some way or another but he doesn’t. He’s texting someone, most likely Durbe judging by the colors of the conversation bubbles in the chat.

He steps into the kitchen and hears the jingle of the bell from Foofie’s collar come charging up behind him.

“Her treats are on the counter behind the toaster,” Nasch yells to him.

The cat comes within two feet of him and flops onto her side, exposing her belly.

“Of course you’re so spoiled,” Vector says with a smirk as he reaches for the hidden container of treats. He holds out two of them in an open hand which the cat swipes onto the ground with her nose.

After Foofie trots happily back to Nasch Vector takes a better look around the kitchen. This is quite possibly one of the most outdated rooms in the house with the checkerboard floor and god-awful mustard-colored metal cabinets. The table is definitely from a few decades ago and it's something Vector has only seen in vintage magazines tucked tightly in boxes at local antique shops. Minus the pinup girl wearing only an apron sitting on top, of course.

To his right, Vector sees a wood-burning stove with an empty, coffee cup on top of it. As he approaches to get a better look at the picture on it, he knocks a glass jar off the corner of the counter that he definitely didn’t see. Nasch comes running at the noise before Vector can even process what happened.

“Ah fuck,” Nasch says with a chuckle. “I knew I should have put that back.”

Vector smells something familiar and looks down to the remnants of the jar and its contents at his feet.

Nasch motions for Vector to scooch aside which he does. Nasch slides on a pair of house shoes so he doesn’t step in glass and begins to pick up the contents of the jar.

“What a fucking stash,” Vector laughs. “Awful place for it though.”

“Thanks,” Nasch replies. “It's normally upstairs but I got too high last night and passed out on the couch for a coup[le hours.”

Vector carefully steps over the glass on the floor as Nasch sorts through it. He returns to the spot with the broom and dustpan. He sweeps quietly where Nasch points to until everything has been sorted through and what can be salvaged is.

Nasch checks the time on his phone then glances out the kitchen window. It's been roughly 30 minutes and the rain hasn’t stopped as he had hoped. In fact, it turned into some disgusting, wet slushy mix. Judging by the way It's already started to stick to the ground, Vector isn’t going anywhere any time soon. He watches Nasch check the radar which looks completely different than it did this morning.

“You don’t have to work tomorrow, do you?” Nasch asks him.

“Thank fucking God, no,” Vector replies. 

Within the next 20 minutes, Vector finds himself in a pair of Nasch’s extremely oversized sweatpants and sitting on the covered back porch. They're searching for a lighter one of them put on the table two seconds ago. The wintry mix has fully turned to freezing rain. Vector’s hands are practically ice as he finds the lighter someone apparently knocked on the floor. He hands it to Nasch who puts it back in his pocket. He stands and motions for Vector to follow him inside, which he does.

They find themselves sitting next to each other in the conversation pit in the living room. Nasch has a projector on and has been scrolling through some streaming service Vector has never heard of. When he finds something to put on and hits play, it goes largely ignored.

He almost forgot how talkative Nasch gets when he’s not sober.

 _‘Cute,'_ he thinks. Vector pauses for a moment, tries to pinpoint where that thought came from but turns up empty-handed.

He leans back on the sectional and presses a pillow behind his lower back to make himself more comfortable. He’s not even paying attention to what the man next to him says but notes how nice it is to be in someone’s company. Nasch laughs at a few words he switches around in a sentence accidentally.

Nasch laughs.

It's warm enough to send a shiver down Vector’s spine; genuine and true enough to make his breath hitch when the sound hits his ears. It feels scarily familiar.

Nasch smiles just the same.

Vector feels his body start to tingle as his senses numb further. He closes his eyes for just a moment. He inhales deeply through his nose, exhales through his mouth. In the split second, before he opens his eyes again, he expects a large, rectangular room decorated with fine tapestries from other Monarchs. For just a moment he’s sitting on the edge of a down-filled mattress, tracing nonexistent patterns into silk sheets. There’s a draft of sea breeze and the sheer, white curtains covering the archway to the balcony flutter in protest as they are moved by it. The white marble is cold beneath his feet. He feels the mattress dip slightly next to him as someone shifts in their sleep. He’s leaving today and doesn’t know when or if he’ll be back

He knows this place well though. He could navigate these halls blindfolded if he had to.

When he opens his eyes, Nasch is there kneeling in front of him and gently placing a glass of water in his hands. The room spins and Vector leans forward slightly.

“Are you feeling okay?” Nasch whispers.

Vector nods and holds the cup gently with both hands. He must have closed his eyes for a little longer than he thought.

“Do you want a straw?”

Vector doesn’t reply but Nasch puts a metal straw with a purple silicone tip in his cup anyway. Nasch sits down on the floor in front of him, hands clasped in his lap. He looks concerned and for a moment until Vector takes a sip.

“Two more sips then I’ll put it on the coffee table,” Nasch tells him.

He obeys and takes two more large sips of the water before Nasch takes it from him and does as promised. He sits back on the couch next to him and Vector swears he’s closer than before. Nasch quiets down, keeps talking to a minimum, and instead scrolls through social media for a while. Leaving Vector to his racing thoughts. He finds himself on the crossroad of _‘One of us has had shitty weed for a long time and I’m not used to being this high’_ and _‘I don’t think I’m going to make it home tonight because of the sleet’._

He leans forward, resigns to his temporary fate, and takes another drink of water from the cup on the coffee table. When he leans back into the sofa, he makes himself comfortable and closes his eyes again for just a moment.

He is no longer in the bedroom like he was before. This room is dark and musty. The stone floor here is uneven and it is far too quiet. He realizes that he is on his knees and looks to see a bloodied and beaten Nasch in the split second before he turns around and walks away. He looks like he just had his heart torn out of his chest and Vector doesn't know why. He looks down at his own hands and sees that they’re absolutely covered in blood that has barely begun to dry.

“What have I done?”


End file.
